Updated 10:01 am, Friday, June 24, 2011

The impetus is a study unveiled Thursday that calls for construction of a new 96-bed lockup behind the sheriff’s offices on U.S. 290 at a cost of approximately $10.5 million.

A new jail is the centerpiece of the report by Justice Concepts Inc., the consultants hired in 2010 to examine the county’s criminal justice system.

The company’s 56-page report includes numerous other suggestions aimed at hastening the processing of criminal cases to reduce the jail population and, thereby, county costs. Those include hiring more prosecutors and public defenders, expediting the departure of defendants to prison and the possible creation of a county court at law.

Executing those initiatives might prove less challenging than getting voters to fund a major new facility.

“Right now the economy is not good, and it’s going to be a tough sell,” County Judge Mark Stroeher said after the briefing by Justice Concepts principal Allen Beck and Fort Worth architect Kenny Burns.

Given the study required, he said, the soonest the issue could potentially go before voters is May.

State officials have vowed to close the current jail, built in 1974, if its capacity of 15 is exceeded.

The county, which now averages about 40 inmates a day, has rented cells in other counties since 1992, the same year voters overwhelmingly defeated expanding the current jail.

The county spent $395,000 in 2010 to rent cells elsewhere, Beck said, and $32,000 more to ship inmates back and forth.

He said housing all defendants in town would improve court efficiency and allow deputies now transporting prisoners to instead patrol local streets.

“When are you going to bite the bullet?” he asked county officials at the first of two briefings Thursday. “The longer we wait, the higher these (construction) costs shift upward.”

He’ll get no argument from Sheriff Buddy Mills who, like his predecessor, has publicly called for a new jail.

“Over the years, our prisoner population has drastically outgrown the current jail,” he said afterward. “We need to have our people housed here locally. We don’t need to be transporting them all over, which creates liability and safety issues.”

Besides the price of a new jail, county commissioners said they need to know the ongoing operational costs before deciding whether to proceed.

Commissioner Donnie Schuch said, “If we move ahead, we have to educate the public.”

That point was emphasized by Fredericksburg City Councilman Graham Pearson, who blamed the defeat in May of a $3.2 million city bond plan for a new swimming pool on an inadequate marketing strategy.

“For this to be successful, you’ve got to come up with a program to sell the concept to the community,” he said.